K: "We all want to help. When you see suffering in the world there is an intense desire to help; "

Your brain is conditioned your way, mine in my way. Acting out of that conditioning, conflict could be inevitable. Especially if they are in opposition in some way. But if you become aware of your conditioning and I of mine, isn’t that awareness the same for you as for me. Is it the awareness that discovers the false when there is no judgement in what is seen? If awareness is not part of our conditioning, what is it?

Sorry I don’t understand how your response addresses the question: Is the brain conditioned to identify with itself? Try again? :slight_smile:

Awareness doesn’t “do” anything, and it is not “part of our conditioning”. It is direct perception before the director (the brain’s conditioning) alters, distorts it accordingly.

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How could it be otherwise? The brain is conditioned to do what it does, just like the pancreas.

Our usual emotional reactions to the suffering of others arising for example thanks to the evolutionary traits ingrained in our lineage of social animal ancestors; and reinforced culturally in our case.

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That would mean our conditioning is (part of) the problem, non?

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Conditioning - which in its fundamental or broadest sense, is determinism or the oneness/interconnectedness of the whole, is - and is still happening.

It has produced the first communal, cultured mind in this particular human form; which has in turn produced rationality, imagination, self referentiality, self transcendance (or at least the possibility thereof)

Seeing this or that as a problem, is surely to miss the mark?
Or in American New Age speak : problems are the universe talking to itself.

There are good and bad consequences of conditioning. If being free from conditioning means being free from both the bad and the good, huge loss is involved. Is that a smart strategy?

Isn’t it the ‘conditioning, (programming, ‘brainwashing’) that is creating divisiveness among us that is important here? You identify as something and I identify as something else. That has been the trend until now. But Identification with anything is limiting. Why identify as anything? We have been pushed toward this since childhood and now the weapons to kill each other grow more and more efficient. Psychologically, why identify as anything : saint or sinner it’s all the same? K put it bluntly: “you are nothing (not-a-thing”) If that is so, the question for me is: what is this desire to be something? It doesn’t mean I can’t excel in whatever pursuit is of interest but why ‘identify’ with whatever that may be? Why limit the brain’s potential with the false security of psychological attachment to anything?

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When Krishnamurti gave the example of mistaking a coil of rope for a snake, he spoke of how there is good, necessary conditioning, and cultural conditioning which is “good” only to those who believe it is necessary.

So when K spoke of being free of one’s conditioning, he was referring to cultural conditioning - not the necessary conditioning. It’s the same distinction between psychological and practical thought.

Until/unless the conditioned brain can discern the difference between the two types of thought, conflict and confusion is the human condition.

Imagine an omniscient god that can take human form.
It can see through the eyes of fear, and feel completely crushed by the weight of loss and gain. And at the same time it can be free from that power and relate to existence from outside of the veil of fear - it can both be the conditioning and see what conditioning is.

Which strategy should it take? The path of fear or the path of clarity?

Perhaps a too obvious example of destructive ‘conditioning’ : a child grows up in a ‘Christian’ household and hears about miracles, God, etc goes to church, confesses ‘sins’…grows up and hears that Trump is the return of the Messiah; the one that everyone was waiting for. What’s a poor mercilessly conditioned brain to do?

We are conditioned to choose what is true and false, good and bad, right and wrong, etc., instead of being choicelessly aware of what is actual; instead of perceiving directly.

the question for me is: what is this desire to be something?

It’s called “ambition”.

Why limit the brain’s potential with the false security of psychological attachment to anything?

If the brain is limiting itself, the self-limiting brain must ponder this question. But if the brain is not limiting itself, is free, unlimited, it knows and understands why other brains are doing this.

Problem is thought is rarely 100% psychological or 100% practical. It’s usually a mix. There is often (arguably always!) a psychological aspect to practical thought, and vice-versa.

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But I am not talking about gods, rather: us befuddled clay-footed horribly/beautifully flawed mortals! Is it more skillful to step out of the game entirely and lose everything conditioning has brought us, the good and bad? (I.e. work outside the system.) Or to shift the balance toward the good? (Work within the system.)

Neither am I. Does that help? I mean if you let all your bagage with God go and read the analogy again. Is the argument still not comprehensible?

As it stands (or maybe even by definition), this so called skillful step is just a confused idea. We should drop this idea that it is possible or a good idea for the confused fool to take a skillful step and concentrate on the only step : seeing what I is. (or freedom from confusion via understanding - which necessitates honesty and selfless curiosity - something we unfortunately cannot control)

There is no either/or, no actual separation.

Can we work with the fear or clarity analogy again? If you read it again without worrying about gods, does it not answer your question? (of whats the best strategy - even from the point of view of the scared imaginative primate)

Or maybe I should ask : does it take divine powers of omniscience to see what I am? to be aware of the process of self in movement? Am I not living it?

Okay, rewritten with no mention of God:

People who feel ‘crushed by the weight of loss and gain’ should maybe get off that ride.

But I think most of us feel crushed by loss (negative emotions) and uplifted by gain (positive). Emotionally, life is like a roller coaster. For those of us on that ride, optimizing your way of living by maximizing the positive (joy, happiness, love, beauty) might be the most skillful move.

I realize it’s rather un-Krishnamurtian to advocate for modest and conventional baby steps, to work within rather than outside zee system. I’m trying it on for size, and dadgummit, it fits quite well!

The weight of loss and gain is the foundation of your question :

And also your answer :

Depending solely on the movement of self (dictat of profit and loss aka dukha/suffering) is no solution to the problem of self. (it is the problem/issue)
And if self is not a problem, then no point tying oneself in knots about it.

I feel that we are talking past each other. Let’s start over, okay? Conditioning makes us what we are, determines what we experience, what we do. Maybe not 100%, but close enough. We are through and through creatures of conditioning. All aspects of us, the ‘good’ and the ‘bad.’ Conditioning is what gets us out of bed, drives us, makes things matter to us, gives our lives meaning. Being free of conditioning would entail a profound loss, the loss of all we know and of all the ways we are accustomed to being in the world. I can see the draw if you hate your life. But what about if you’re quite happy?

Again, the expression of profit and loss as the sole motive of existence/experience.
If my vision of reality is solely the projection of fear, this is utter dependence.

Can we back up this fear/claim? Demonstration, reasoning? nb. freedom does not mean ignorance.

Then no problem. No real need to look in to the matter.

Yes, the fusion of psychological and practical thought creates the confusion that is incoherent thought, so psychological thought is not always clearly discernible. Nevertheless, if the brain is to be free of psychological thought, it seems to me it must be able to detect it so as to be immune to it. One could say that what keeps the brain free and unlimited is its creation of the antibody for psychological thought.

The paradox, of course, is that this awakening and creation of the antibody takes place before practical thought can articulate it, which means the brain is free before it knows it.